


they're already ghosts

by frozennightmare



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: AU, Angst, F/M, The Snowmen, i swear its more fluffy than angst, victorian au, well sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-02
Updated: 2013-09-02
Packaged: 2017-12-25 10:47:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/952166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozennightmare/pseuds/frozennightmare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The universe must think itself hilarious, creating ghosts for him like this. The Snowmen AU in which Rose is Clara. Sort of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	they're already ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> title from Daughter's song "Run"  
> i'm not dead i swear just incredibly busy like ive had this in my drafts for ages and just decided to upload it now  
> inspired by : huggleston.tumblr.com/post/31295973150/doctor-who-au-the-doctor-lands-in-victorian

He decides to spend the day off his cloud.  
You've got to do to it sometime, the Doctor tells himself, or sooner or later you will read every book in the universe. And he has before; it's not like it's the first time or anything. He just doesn't like it. Just...people.  
The only reason he picked Victorian London as his hangout was the promise of Jenny and Vastra, having a couple of friends around that could help him out. But it had turned out that they like adventuring a little too much, so nowadays he mostly hid on his cloud. They could adventure all they wanted, he doesn't care.   
Those days are past him now, though. All the Doctor wants to do was rest. Rest, and on off days when people are bearable, days like today when the snow was crisp and the air is fresh and bright, days when the sun has cast its last rays without a fuss-  
These are the days he comes down.  
The people are cheery today, laughing and talking in the streets and picking out gifts for their families. He remembers how close Christmas is getting. This'll be his third Christmas here. He doesn't mind them, but they are never one of the days he comes down. Jenny and Vastra always trying to pull him into their dinners because apparently "they're family." No, thank you. His last remnants of family is trapped in 1938.  
"Looks like the old man has come down again." someone whispers behind him. He thinks for a moment that it's Jenny, and turns around to bother her for bothering him, because he was actually starting to have a good day, dammit, but there's no sign of her or her lizard wife. The voice, the accent, was all wrong too.  They must have been talking about someone else. Still, he feels like someone's watching him.  
Silly old man, silly Doctor. Who would be watching him? He's not even noticed around here. Just the way he likes it.  
There are too many people here, so he cuts down a back alleyway. That's better. Peace and quiet, just how he likes it. Of course, this is London, so it's not completely abandoned, but he no longer feels like he's about to be trampled.  
That feeling again, like someone's following him. There's no one there, he's looked a million times, yet it persists. Who could be that good?  
He's had enough of people for today, he's going back to the cloud so he can shake his tail and stop Jenny or Vastra from running into him. Their intentions were pure, but he didn't want them.  
He goes to cross the street, then stops when he sees the traffic jam that's started. Across the street, Jenny waves him over eagerly while Vastra inspects things with that- oh, God. Abort mission. He's getting out of here.  
The Doctor turns to run, then crashes spectacularly into someone. The alley's been pretty much cleared at this point, thanks to the attention the carriage wreck is causing. They must have been right behind him.  
"Sorry," he splutters. "I'll just be on my way-"  
"I don't think so, mate."  
He raises his head and hears the click of a pistol being cocked. Shit. Fuck and damn it all to hell he's attracted the attention of someone who matters. Now just to see who was following him- that voice sounded so familiar earlier.  
Start at the bottom, work your way up. Black heeled boots, dark green ruffled skirt- a woman, oh, Victorian London can be surprising sometimes, for all its usual backwards ideas. A man's white shirt and black waistcoat, she likes breaking rules, this one. Dark pink gloves and a tiny little gun that probably packs more punch than it looks like it does  And- _no._  
"Are you a ghost?" asks the Doctor.  
"What kind of question is that?" she asks. But, and maybe he's imagining it, she seems just a little bit shaken by him. A little bit off guard.   
He's got to finish the picture. Blonde curls pinned up under a dark green hat with a pink-and-white striped bow, and the face of his very dear Rose Tyler staring at him.  
This is his mind, telling him that isolation is finally driving him crazy. It has to be. There is literally no other explanation for what is happening here.  
"At least tell me your name." This will be it, proof he's gone crazy.  
"I don't work like that. Up and at 'em, back up against the wall."  
She's rather nice about the fact she's about to kill him.  
Wait. This can't be him going crazy, if she's about to kill him. He knows his own mind well enough to know that is a thing that just doesn't happen. It has to be real.  
But it can't be!  
Answers later, he decides. First order of business:  
Run.  
"Where do you think you're going?" she shouts. The Doctor plunges back into the crowd of people. She wouldn't dare shoot him here, it's too easy to miss. She will follow him, though, and that's going to make things difficult.   
The Doctor leaves the crowd and hits St. James Park, where the TARDIS is parked. He's in the open now, he's fair game.   
The tree to the left of him explodes into a missile of frozen sap and superheated bark. Bless how inaccurate weapons in this century are. Rose-the Ghost- whoever she is- will hit him eventually. It might take her a while.  
He takes a flying leap to grab the end of the TARDIS ladder, scrambling up like a flying monkey and only pausing to look down once.   
Then he freezes.  
She stares up at him, hands trembling ever so slightly, dead shot available but not taking it. She doesn't actually talk, only mouths a single question up at him.  
 _Who are you?_  
Then he is up the ladder and long gone.  
....  
His curiosity is going to kill him. Who was she? Why did she look so much like Rose? They were doppelgängers, they even sounded alike, yet there's no possible way it was her. And why did she want to kill him? Add that to the list of things that don't  make sense.   
Yes, it is four am, but his questions had kept him up all night. Yes, he has sworn off adventuring, but he needs to know. Now. It doesn't count anyways, this isn't really an adventure. Just something-something to do.  
He dismounts his cloud and follows the string of footprints in the snow all the way out of the park and onto a merchant's street.  
 They end just outside an inn. The Rose and Crown. It's fitting. Too fitting. The universe is cackling at him again.  
"Shut up!" he hisses through gritted teeth. It's like he can actually hear the laughter.  
"You followed me?"  
Dammit. She snuck up on him. Again.  
The woman still has her pistol aimed at him.   
"That was a bad idea, following me. I'm not gonna miss this time."  
"No you're not."  
"Really. Go on, tell me why."  
"You're not going to for the same reason you didn't before, because for some reason you can't explain, something is bothering you about me. It doesn't make any sense, because you know you've never seen me before today, that it's the very first time we met and you intended it to be the last. But something feels so very familiar about me, you feel like you know me, and it's a little bit scary. That's why you won't shoot me. You're /curious/, curious to how we could possibly know each other even though this is the first day we've spoken. Do I have it right?"  
He's pounced on a barrel sitting outside the bar, leaning over into her face. God, she's pretty. He has forgotten how pretty she was.  
"That's creepy, but yeah. How did you-"  
He rolls his eyes. "Because I'm clever. Now tell me, what's your name?"  
This is it, final conformation that he's not crazy.  
"You know I don't like that."  
"What's the harm? Help an old man's curiosity."  
She lets out a long breath apprehensively. "Marion. Marion Tyler. But you can call me Rose, everyone around here does anyways."  
"Why the nickname?" His heart is thudding in his chest in a flurry of staccato beats. It can't- it just can't-  
She sighs, like she's told the story a thousand times. "It's cause of where I work. My friend Clara got me the job, but she knew I didn't like to give out my name. So people just called me the "barmaid at the Rose and Crown." Eventually it just got shortened to Rose. I like it better than Marion, anyways. Your turn, then, what's your name?"  
His mouth has gone all dry and crackly, his heart flying so fast it could break into flames from overuse. Every little movement, every twist of her accent is just as he remembered, the little hair flips, the way she bites her upper lip when nervous.   
She's impossible.  
"John-John Smith." he stammers.  
"Like hell it is. I was honest with you, mate. Don't do this to me."  
"Fine. It's the Doctor."  
"Doctor what?"  
"Just-just the Doctor."  
"Okay, /Doctor/," and then she breaks out into laughter.  
"What's so funny?"  
"I don't know," says Rose, looking puzzled. "I- I don't know why I- I just feel so happy and so sad at the same time and I don't know why."  
He puts a hand on her shoulder, like he always used to do. Rose doesn't react, neither shrugging him off or smiling at him.   
/You don't make any sense./  
"So who are you working for? Who wants me dead?" It's a stretch to get out of her, but he has to try."  
"I'm better at business than that, yeah? I don't ask questions. I just do the job. Tell me, Doctor, what do you do? Why would my employer want you dead?"  
"Oh, there are a million reasons."  
"Here, here's what I'm going to do." Rose states. "I'm going to go back to bed and pretend we never met here. Tomorrow, same time, meet me on Waterloo if you're still curious. I can't guarantee your safety though."  
"You've got yourself a deal, Ms. Tyler."  
He's whistling as he walks away.

......  
The Doctor is pacing the TARDIS at three in the morning.   
Again.  
In a hour he'll go find out who this Rose is, what she does. But he's got too many questions that no one knows the answers to. Who is she? A cruel joke by someone with cloning abilities? Or a woman who is just that, just a woman, just Marion Tyler, a girl with an unfortunate nickname and nothing else, and the rest is his madness? Or is there some other explanation for his pink-and-yellow ghost?  
Everything's a viable option here.  
His front pocket scorches unexpectedly. Ow. Oh, a call on the psychic paper! Not really what he's expecting at the moment. Course, he's gotten tons since he settled on the cloud, but he's ignored them. Saving the universe isn't his job anymore.  
Oh, well, he's bored enough; might as well see what the universe wants this time.  
 _Doctor!_  
What? No! But that's her- that's Marion's-Rose's-whoever the fuck she is-that's her handwriting.   
Dammit, the universe is enjoying this.  
He nearly hurts himself coming down the ladder, then runs all the way to the Rose & Crown. The front door is locked and the lights are off. Well, the lock's easy enough. He decides to leave the lights off so any sleepwalkers might not see him creeping about.  
The doors to the inn portion of the bar are all identical. Dammit. Not a way to tell which one is hers.  
One of the doors opens and a light flickers on as Rose wanders out into the hallway.  
"What are you doing here?"   
She's dressed in her nightie, and she looks like she's been crying.  
"You called!"  
"I don't remember doing that."  
He moves to grab the psychic paper, then thinks better of it. That's happened before, in the older times, people not realizing they called him. Explaining never got him very far.  
"Why are you crying?" he asks.  
Rose shakes her head. "It's nothing. Why-why don't you go back to your place for a while, I'll-I'll-I'll meet you in an hour."   
It's like she has to convince herself to say every word.  
"Rose-"  
"You idiot!" she half-shouts, talking both to herself and the Doctor in one sentence. "You're so trusting. Did you really think that I would give up my secrets that easily?"  
"Then-what-"  
"It's a trap, it was going to be, get you shot and get this over with, but I can't do it, can I? I can't do my damn job. I've been up all night, I can't sleep because of you. I hope you're happy."  
"But why would you do that?"  
She shrugs. "Cause I need the money. Why else? Girl's gotta make a living somehow. My clients" and she puts airquotes around clients, which is really strange given the fact that this is 1856, "aren't supposed to talk to me. But for some reason, I can't finish you, and that's gonna get me killed, innit."  
"No, no it won't! I won't let it."  
"Why do you care so much? I tried to-"  
Rose stops talking and slams into him, his head snapping into the brick wall and stars dancing in his eyes painfully. The back window explodes into a shower of glass.   
"They know- they know I've betrayed them, we're going to die-"  
She's terrified, and with good cause. There's no time to embrace to the pain or the fact he probably has a concussion.   
He grabs her hand. "Run."  
The other people in the inn are waking from the gunshots, raising a commotion at their doors as they barge out the back. Rose clings to his hand like he's the only thing she's got, and he has to remind himself that she's a highly trained assassin and could probably kill him if she wanted to. She's just tired and scared and needs a hand to hold. Who hasn't needed that at some point?  
St. James. If they can make it to St. James everything will be alright. But it's three in the morning and the streets are abandoned and the people who are chasing them probably won't have any qualms about shooting anyone who might be out here.   
Six blocks. Maybe, just maybe...  
One of the shots explodes a barrel of fish, and the watery mess fills the earth behind them. The Doctor smirks a little bit, allows himself some hope. That'll slow them down a bit.  
Three blocks.   
Two.   
One.  
Battered and out of breath, he sonics the locked fence from a distance and sprints right through, then pulls the ladder down the same way.   
"What the 'ell?"  
"Later, come on!"  
He doesn't have time to retract the ladder, only turn and sprint up the stairs and hope that nobody follows him. No such luck- he can hear the clanging of footsteps on the ladder already.   
"Where are we going?" Rose gasps.  
"Just follow me!" He's got no time for questions. A snap of the fingers and the TARDIS doors are open and waiting.  
"It's bigger-on the inside-"  
"Aha!"   
He pulls a lever and the TARDIS shudders violently, knocking them both to the floor.   
"It's bigger."breathes Rose, rolling over on her back and propping herself up with her elbows. "It's bigger on the inside!"  
"Isn't it fantastic?"  
"What did you do? Can't they just open the doors?"  
"No they can't, they're locked. And not just that-"  
He opens the doors grandly, bright sunlight streaming in. It's a little blinding.  
"December 24, 1856! We traveled six days forward in time."  
"/What?/" Rose shields her eyes with her arm until he closes the doors. "Lemme recap, mate. I just betrayed myself and possibly my life on a hunch, I've slept maybe six hours in the past two days, I'm still in my nightgown, and you're tellin' me we just traveled in /time/?"  
"That's it, that's what she does, my TARDIS, she travels in time. Well, time and space. Anywhere and anywhen in the universe, anything that has or will happen, I can go there."   
"Okay. Not buying it but I'll play along for now." She sighs and rubs her eyes. "God, I'm tired..."  
"I'll go make you a cup of coffee. Oh, and second door to the right downstairs. Go get yourself some real clothes."  
She just shrugs and goes with it. The "this makes sense" train left a /long/ time ago anyways.   
When the Doctor comes back, she's in the black-and-pink dress, the one she- or whichever version it was he met first-wore to Cardiff on one of their first adventures. Of bloody course. She is Rose Tyler, after all.  
Rose accepts the coffee gladly. It's a bit more juiced up than the regular stuff- okay, severely more. It'll solve most sleep deprivation problems. Out of nearly thirteen hundred years of traveling the universe, he had never thought one of his best discoveries would be super-coffee.  
As soon as she's functional, he opens the doors again.   
"Christmas Eve! Excited? Or do you still not believe me?"  
"Let's get off the cloud first, then we'll talk."  
There's no one on the stairs, no one in the park. Rose's employers didn't stick around.   
He holds out an arm as they merge with the ratpack of London.   
"My lady?"  
Rose rolls her eyes but takes it anyway.  
"Marion's actually my middle name." she says. "I was just going to tell you that, but then I wanted you to know my real name, so I made up the bullshit story about it being my nickname."  
"I believed it."  
"You're either incredibly thick or incredibly trusting, I haven't decided what yet."  
"So how did you start with this job anyways?"  
They pass a band playing in the square, and Rose smiles at the violin player. "Been a while since I played." she says, half to herself, before answering the question. "My parents died in a fire when I was fourteen. Scraped it out on the streets for a couple months, but it wasn't easy. I had a eight year old little brother, Tony. The plauge got him pretty quick. Then my friend Clara-she was always better off than the rest of us- says she's got a job for me. She ended up dead a couple weeks later, but I didn't care. I had a place to sleep and food every night. It was a better alternative then dying alone on the streets."   
"So-"  
"Six years now. Never bothered me until you came along."  
She's such a curiosity, this Rose, both his and not his. This Rose is a assassin who never had a pause before, an orphan who plays violin and lost her little brother, a woman who's braver than she looks and cleverer than she thinks. Oh, what curiosities the universe has spun him today.   
"Doctor!"  
Rose tenses up beside him, one hand on her pistol and the other on his arm. He clears his throat.  
"Jenny! Merry Christmas!"  
"Not here." she growls. She looks a bit more battered than usual.  
"What's going on?"   
"First tell me who the chick is." Yeah. Jenny's definitely had a rough couple of days.  
"Hey!" Rose is quite a bit offended at being called a "chick".  
"Jenny, she's okay, she's an old friend." Well, it isn't exactly a lie...  
She glances around shiftily before guiding them into an alley. Madame Vastra is standing uncloaked in the shadows, and Rose stops for a moment.   
"She-Is she-"  
"Meet Madame Vastra. Don't patronize her, she'll kick you ass in a heartbeat. You doin all right?"  
"Perfectly fine, yeah."  
The lizardess pricks her eyebrows at Rose before turning to the Doctor. "Someone's spent the last six days trying to kill me and my wife, and I'd like to know why."  
"Wait-so it's not just me? Rose?"  
"Told ya, I don't do the asking."  
"So if they're trying to kill the three of us...well, Jenny and Vastra are fairly well known, they're practically like the protectors of London. And well...I used to be. That's not my job anymore. So whoever it is, they're trying to get us out of the way so they can do what they want to the city. There you go, Vastra, there's your answer, now I'm going to go finish what I was doing."  
Rose grabs hold of his shoulder. "Wait! So you're just going to walk away? If you're right, this is important!"  
"Not my job. Jenny and Vastra can handle it themselves."  
"What, so you're curious about me but not willing to help them? Am I your "job"?"  
"It's a long story."  
"Why can't we-"  
"Look, Rose, anyone I try to help ends up dead or worse. I don't want to hurt anyone else."  
"Yes, but if you-if you just  _stand_  there it practically guarantees. bad things-"  
"Please stop talking."  
"- if you're so apathetic why don't I just go home then?"  
He grinds his teeth together. Dammit, she's got him in a corner again.  
Rose nods. "I thought so. See, you do care, just about all the wrong things."  
 _"Fine._  You're in charge now, where do we start."  
 "Isn't it obvious? We go talk to my employer. Well, sneak around. If he sees me I'm dead in the water."  
"Sure you feel comfortable doing that? You were-"  
"A mess earlier? I know. But you-you make me feel braver. I don't think it's a good thing, but it's the truth."  
She grabs his hand and looks around shiftily before guiding him into a darker area of the city. "Come on, bowtie."  
The streets are practically a labyrinth back here. He hates it, doing things again, it can only end badly, but he's too fascinated by Rose to do anything.  
What's his problem, anyways? Why does it have to be her that pulls him back into action? Did he really let himself get that attached to Amy, that her being gone could crush him that much? He should have let her go long before, he knows what happens to people who travel with him. He held her back, glorious Pond, or she should have been glorious. She would have been glorious, if it hadn't been for him dragging her across the universe on wild adventures.   
Amy was the one he should have let go, not Rose. Rose was the one he left behind that he never should have. He gave her up so easily back then, too worried about her and not about how much it would destroy him.   
Boy, he just fucks everything up, doesn't he?  
"Here." whispers Rose, letting go of his hand. The window is a bit too high for either of them; but a box quickly fixes that.  
A man in a dark red suit is in deep conversation with a figure in a black robe, the man's fingers tapping on the head of a dragon-shaped cane. He is tall and sharp, like a dagger given life.  
"Who's who, what am I looking at?" hisses the Doctor.  
"Creepy black-robe. I have no idea who he is."  
He nods, not daring to speak if he doesn't have to.  
The black-robed one turns to walk away. "Look." points Rose. "His footsteps, they're scorched into the wood."  
"Oh! You know, there's not many species in the universe with a body temperature that high that can stand this cold as well. Take one step into the snow, and they'd freeze from lack of outside heat. That's a special one in there, I wonder-"  
"Wonder what?" The voice is like flames consuming kindling, crackling and hungry; the beast in the robe has crept up without them noticing.   
"Oh, hello!" There's no space to run, so he stalls. "What are you, exactly? Leaving scorch marks in the floor, now that's unique. Whatever you are, you're brilliant, that's what."  
"My name is Raelin, and that is all you need know."  
"Raelin? Not the Flame Warrior Raelin? I've heard of you, you've got quite the reputation. But Pyramus was destroyed years ago, and only a couple of you got out, am I right? That's it, I get it now! London is a huge pyre waiting to go up, it's so much wood. It won't burn forever, you know."  
"It will start it. That is all we need."  
"But why choose the Earth? It rains here, you know. You'd be killed by a good old thundercloud!"  
"That is enough answers."   
The alley is filling with smoke, and he realizes Raelin isn't alone. Flame Warriors hiss onto the edges of buildings, steaming, surrounding them.  
"Run!" he shouts.  
The ground is boiling, the air thick and gray, and they run for freedom with all their strength. There are bullets from these adversaries as well as fireballs, oh that's just wonderful, the Flame Warriors would love guns, weapons powered by fire!  
They've gone the wrong way now, back through the alley the other way instead of out. Great.   
Wait! The river's this way. It'll be frozen this time of year. Cold, but it will protect them.  
"Jump!" he shouts.   
"Are you mad?" She can see his plan. She hates it. He doesn't blame her.  
"Oh, yes!"   
She closes her eyes and jumps.   
The polar water is worse than a brick wall, soaking them and freezing them solid in the same moment. Even with his teeth chattering, the Doctor can't help but laugh as the Flame Warriors turn away disgruntled. Rose laughs too, a bearish cackle at their success.  
"Your bowtie's gone all droopy." she says out of nowhere. "It's gonna freeze as sad as you are."  
He chuckles, still treading water. She's so close- not that she hasn't been before, but they've nearly died together for the third time. That does things to him.  
Things that want to make him violently make out with the blonde assassin.   
Yeah, it's too cold for that.   
They climb out of the water, and she reaches to try to fix his bowtie. It has frozen like that.   
Three inches, and she's got  _that look._  
Heheh.  
"You're so cold." he whispers. She's trembling, and he sets a frigid hand on her ghost-white face.   
Kissing her is a lot warmer than just staring. At first he hardly remembers that he's ever even touched her before; that body has faded like a bad memory. Maybe that's a good thing. Neither of them remember the other, it's a chance to restart.  
It's also resisting the urge to start eating her face because he's missed her so much. All of her.   
She's got snowflakes frozen on her half-close eyelids, he realizes, and smiles beneath her lips before drawing back. His Rose, growing in the middle of the snow, so stubborn even still.  
"What do we do? Do we find Jenny and Vastra?" she asks after a second.   
"Give them their peace. I've got an idea."  
There's no urgency when he takes her hand his time. Only peace, and the growing sensation of warmth in his chest, it's been too long since he felt that warmth.   
"Do you want to come with me?" he asks. "When this is over. It's not safe for you here anymore."  
"And where would we go?"  
"Anywhere, anytime. Whenever you want."  
"I would like that, yeah. You know, I've always wanted to see 1963."  
"Why then?"  
"I don't know. It feels like the perfect time in the future to go, isn't that odd?"  
"It is, it really is!"  
They both giggle like children.  
"So what's this plan?" asks Rose.  
"The reason they've made it this far is because it's so cold. They can handle the temperature because it's changing the rain to snow. If it rained like it's been snowing, they would sizzle out and die."  
"So we make it rain?"  
"The only way they can make the flames remain is if they change the temperature of the city so it's a desert. They've got to have an atmospheric converter somewhere, if we just raise the temperature a few more degrees, they'll be rained out! The only problem is where-"  
"Any details?"  
"It needs to be tall, something with machinery-"  
They realize it in unison.   
"Big Ben!"  
"Well, what are we waiting for?" he shouts. Time to run again, run and run and run until they are perched in the upper room of the clock.  
"I've never been up here before." says Rose. "Isn't it fantastic?"  
"Aha! There it is!" A whirring tangle of altered clockwork is stacked in the corner. "Just give me a moment-"  
A flash of green from his sonic, and the sky cracks like a whip before unleashing it's deluge on the city below. The air warms comfortably around them, the river water not feeling so cold anymore. Back around the alleys they had been in, a thick cloud of fog rises.   
"That's not fog, is-"  
"Smoke. They're not completely dead, just reduced to their original, non-warriory state. Massive salamanders, that's what they are!"  
Rose throws her arms around him.   
"We did it!"  
"We did it." he agrees.  
They start walking downstairs.   
Everything is right with the world now, right as it can be anymore. He has his Rose. Somehow, impossibly, it is her. He doesn't care how odd the situation is anymore. It is what it is.  
They're one floor and three feet from the exit when shots rang out, cracking the wall. One hits the wall, one nearly kills him, and the next two go wide as they duck behind the wall. He can see just enough to identify a Flame Warrior in all her glory.   
"She must have followed us here. Six-loaded pistol, there'll be two bullets left in hers, they've got a funny sound." Rose whispers hoarsely. "I think I can-"  
She peeks around the wall.   
"I don't like this." hisses the Doctor.  
"Get used to it, Doctor."   
She leaps out from behind the wall, hands making contact with the Flame Warrior's scaly armor. They both fall over on the ground, and Rose is fighting, fighting for the upper hand, tussling until she has her opponent pinned against the wall.  
It happens too fast for her to stop it- the press of metal to her chest, the powderboom in her ears, the firey feeling of a gunshot rippling through her veins.   
A terrible, high-pitched scream liquifies into a thick pool of blood on her dress. Everything-everything's fuzzy- but she has to- the gun, the Flame Warrior lost it when she shot Rose-  
There. Three inches from her hand. One shot.   
The Flame Warrior turns to run, but collapses two feet from the door in a second scream and powderkeg boom. Rose rolls over on her back, coughing up blood and faint with pain.  
"ROSE!"  
The Doctor sprints from his hiding place as soon as he hears her scream, and is nearly shot himself by the second bullet. Her eyes are flickering, a carmine pool developing on the floor.   
He pulls her into his lap. There's not even a chance he can stop the bleeding in time, not here, not in the 19th century. There's nothing left to do except say goodbye.  
"I remember, I-I have a story for you." she smiles, teeth stained red. "It's about the other me. The one you lost."  
He freezes solid.  
"What-what about her?"  
"She got o-old, as she should, and died in the p-paralell, but the universe wasn't done with her yet. Y-you weren't done with-yet. So she came b-back, to save you. 'Cept she's not done. She still has w-work-"  
Seconds. Oh, God, he can't bear it.   
"Don't leave me. Please." he begs.   
She leans in closer, or tries to, and he closes the gap for her.   
"Novemeber...23...1963. You know...where...I-I'll be."  
Then the last starlight fades from her eyes, head rolling off to the side, the gun she clung to like a lifeline falling out of her hands.   
He presses his lips to her forehead, shaking. No. He came all this way, he had her in his arms-  
His brave Rose. Her courage would always be the death of her.  
Novemeber 23, 1963. Her message. He has to look before he goes mad.   
But first there are things to do, burials to make, goodbyes in the form of Jenny and Vastra.   
Rose was right, though.  
He does know where she'll be.  
.....  
"Rose, are you coming?"  
"Just a minute, Susan, I'll be right there!"  
She stops in the junkyard, checking wildly for the teachers Susan swore had followed them. Her best friend must be going crazy.  
A crackle of footsteps, and she dives behind an old car. Oh God, it really is them. This is what they get for skipping school. She's too scared to move for a good ten minutes, then there's a sound like a car in reverse and she pokes her head out.  
"Susan?"   
No response.  
"Mr. Chesterson?" She even dares to call one of her teacher's names. Still nothing.  
The noise again, except this time only a few feet away, and a wind blowing dust in her face. She turns to see the great blue box,and it feels so familiar, although she can't explain why.  
It feels- it feels like something is starting to come back to her.  
"Doctor?"


End file.
